I caught Elvis Costello at Wolf Trap in Vienna, VA Thursday night. I haven’t heard much of his new bluegrassish album but he and the band sounded pretty good. To be honest, I have trouble dealing with great rockers outside (particularly, after) their prime, be it EC, Dylan, or otherwise. It just seems weird.

In keeping with his appropriated American identity, he played a lot of stuff from King of America (Indoor Fireworks, Brilliant Mistake, American Without Tears) and even one from Almost Blue (Merle Haggard’s “Tonight the Bottle Let Me Down”):https://sowellremembered.files.wordpress.com/2009/06/05-tonight-the-bottle-let-me-down.mp3
He also covered the Dead’s “Friend of the Devil” which seemed to draw more applause and singing-along than “Blame it on Cain” or “The Angels Wanna Wear My Red Shoes.” They also did a nice work-up of the Velvet Underground’s “Femme Fatale.”

Other highlights included a couple tunes from his incomplete concept opera about the life of Hans Christian Andersen.